Tie-Up Functions

What It Does

The Tie-Up menu provides operations for manipulating the tie-up matrix — the grid that connects shafts to treadles. These operations let you transform the tie-up in various ways: clearing, inverting, rotating, flipping, and shifting. There's also a Diagonal button for generating stepped tie-up patterns.

---

Location

• Ribbon: Design tab > Tie-Up dropdown menu

• Right-click: The tie-up area also offers these operations in a context menu

---

Operations

To select the entire tie-up, first bring it into focus by either clicking inside the tie-up area or pressing Tab until a thin green outline surrounds the tie-up box. Then press Ctrl + A, or choose Select All from the Home menu.

To select a portion of the tie-up, press A on the keyboard or choose Select from the Home menu. Then drag to select the desired area of the tie-up.

Once the area is selected, click any of the options under Tie-Up to apply your changes. These same options can also be accessed by right-clicking within the tie-up box.

Clear

Removes all connections in the tie-up (or in the current selection if one is active). Every cell becomes empty — no shafts connected to any treadles.

Change Face

Toggles every cell in the tie-up: filled cells become empty, and empty cells become filled. This swaps which shafts are raised and which are lowered for every treadle, effectively showing you the other side of the fabric.

Original Selection	After Change Face

Invert & Reverse

Invert Flips the tie-up vertically (top to bottom). The top row moves to the bottom and the bottom row moves to the top. This reverses the shaft order within the tie-up — shaft 1's connections swap with the highest shaft, shaft 2 with the next highest, and so on.

Reverse Flips the tie-up horizontally (left to right). The leftmost treadle column moves to the right and vice versa. This reverses the treadle order.

Original Selection	After Invert	After Reverse

Rotate 90 and 180

Rotate 90 rotates the tie-up 90° clockwise. This requires a square selection (same number of shafts and treadles in the selection). If the tie-up isn't square, select a square region first.

Rotate 180 rotates the tie-up 180° — equivalent to applying both Invert and Reverse. Every cell moves to the diagonally opposite position.

Original Selection	After Rotate 90

Shift Right / Shift Left

Moves all tie-up connections one column to the right or left. Connections that shift off the edge wrap around to the opposite side. Hold Shift when clicking to shift without wrapping (connections at the edge are lost instead).

Shift Up / Shift Down

Moves all tie-up connections one row up or down. Connections that shift off the edge wrap around. Hold Shift for no-wrap mode.

Original Selection	After Shift Right (with wrap)

---

Diagonal Button

The Diagonal button (separate from the dropdown) generates a stepped diagonal pattern across the tie-up. It opens a dialog with these settings:

Start Which treadle to begin the diagonal pattern from.

Step How many shafts to step per treadle. A step of 1 creates a simple diagonal (1-2-3-4). A step of 2 skips every other shaft (1-3-5-7).

Treadles per Cycle How many treadles make up one complete cycle before the pattern repeats or extends.

Stop The last treadle to fill with the diagonal pattern.

Direction Step up (shaft numbers increase) or step down (shaft numbers decrease).

If you have a selection in the tie-up, the diagonal is constrained to that shaft range.

---

Tips

• Undo works — Ctrl+Z (Cmd+Z) reverts any tie-up operation.

• Use with selections — If you select a region of the tie-up first, operations apply only to that region. This lets you transform part of the tie-up while leaving the rest unchanged.

• Change Face for the flip side — Change Face is the quickest way to see what the back of your fabric looks like — it inverts the entire interlacement.

• Shift for exploring — Shifting the tie-up left/right or up/down is a great way to explore variations of a pattern without redesigning it.

• Wrap vs. no-wrap — By default, shifts wrap around. Hold Shift when clicking to prevent wrapping — useful when you want to move the pattern without duplicating cells.

---

Quick Reference

Operation	What It Does
Clear	Remove all connections
Change Face	Toggle every cell (filled ↔ empty)
Invert	Flip vertically (top ↔ bottom)
Reverse	Flip horizontally (left ↔ right)
Rotate 90	Rotate clockwise (requires square selection)
Rotate 180	Rotate 180°
Shift Right/Left	Move columns with wrapping
Shift Up/Down	Move rows with wrapping
Diagonal	Generate a stepped diagonal pattern